New Media, Enduring Values Project Overview

It's the question that is on the minds of many editors and reporters these days:  How can we ensure that the most important journalistic principles survive this time of fast-paced change?

Results of a yearlong project, entitled "New Media, Enduring Values (NMEV)," were shared by project participants from the Committee of Concerned Journalists [1], the Missouri School of Journalism [2], the Donald W. Reynolds Journalism Institute [3] and three news organizations at an October 2007 event at the National Press Club in Washington, DC. The three news organizations - the Milwaukee (Wis.) Journal Sentinel, American Public Media, and WHO-TV Des Moines (Iowa) - worked with CCJ and its partners to test how the time-honored values of the journalist's craft can be brought alive in a digital world. The values selected - verification, creating a forum for public compromise and criticism, and making important news interesting - are three of those identified in the seminal book The Elements of Journalism [4] by CCJ founders Bill Kovach [5] and Tom Rosenstiel [6]. 

"We have had a wonderful opportunity here to work with three terrific news organizations on projects that show you can do an even better job of making journalism useful and ethically sound in new formats," said Geneva Overholser [7], holder of the Hurley Chair at the Missouri School of Journalism and a CCJ executive board [8] member. "It's been a lot of fun, and we think we've learned some important lessons to share with others trying to ensure a healthy future for journalism."